SCP-5568 / Discussion

This is the discussion related to the wiki page SCP-5568.

DesertMoonGW 14 Mar 2022 02:45

Second SCP I've written after SCP-4174.

Don't personally expect this to stay up long, to be honest. Had trouble getting critiques and what I did get I didn't know how to work with. Figured this was as good as it was gonna get so I might as well post. One of the critiques I did get said that this was offensive, but they didn't specify how or to whom (or if they did then I didn't understand), so sorry in advance if it is.

EDIT: For some reason, something in the CSS of the Mega Cool Customizable ACS is causing the jumpscare joke thing to always appear and not be able to be hidden. I have no idea how to fix this.

Also, planning on rewriting this since it was met with lukewarm/poor reception, but is an idea that I really want to express.

Last edited on 01 Apr 2022 06:14 by DesertMoonGW Show more

Nats all over 14 Mar 2022 18:56

This is me as well I'm not good with my grammar and I always miss things but some of mine stay up for a good week then I got taken down

---

Nat

OriTiefling 14 Mar 2022 19:39

So I don't hate this, but it needs a lot of work still. It's definitely reading as unpolished.

+Tulpamancy is definitely a niche concept at least.

The conprocs are fine. A bit basic actually if I had to give a critique there. They don't really help foreshadow many story beats despite the emergency update and overall just fail to really hook me in.

The description is equally largely lacking in substantive content. It's very short and to the point, and actually never physically describes the anomaly in case someone else sees her which I thought was odd.

Discovery log- This should've been an MTF log actually. This log is very expository, and as a result it's all tell and no show. It's not very engaging, and I would rather actually see a log of the MTF performing this raid and discovering the anomaly. I'm also curious as to what sparked this raid in the first place.

Good morning Sharon, and your friend.

This is a really weird line. I think the sentiment is supposed to be something more akin to "Good morning Sharon, and to your friend as well."? Right now it doesn't make very much sense.

Weiss: Junior Researcher, sorry, all the big boys are busy elsewhere.

I don't think this interviewer should be giving up this info. Why does the anomaly need to know this? This also puts them in a very vulnerable spot to be taken advantage of as a result.

SCP-5568: Will this interview be written down and read by someone higher?

Weiss: Presumably yes, once you get a proper SCP designation and containment.

SCP-5568: Good, thank you.

This is a very weird exchange. I feel like getting a better sense of their tones of voice would help with little asides like SCP-5568 speaks with desperation or the like, because right now it's a very bland conversation.

but I've become independent after her recent suicide.

This is a fairly major reveal that feels glossed over. We really should've known who this host was and that she killed herself before it's revealed here.

SCP-5568: Jess was a member of a group called The Syndicate,

This is a block of extremely expository text. This info would be better served by us somehow actually seeing these interactions that showcase this place as abusive and manipulative. Maybe the Foundation has been monitoring these guys for a while or something similar, but the delivery of this info right now is just not engaging.

When the skin is just being friends, they get into a lot of cracks.

This is a nonsense statement. It doesn't mean anything.

So I know what tulpas are and all that. At this point you haven't told us how this tulpa went from a split consciousness into its own living thing beyond the host killing themselves. There's a missing step here, because realistically the tulpa should've died with the host body. If you explain it after this point, that's fine, but I feel like it needs to be conveyed to the reader sooner.

Please take this seriously. I know it may sound silly or juvenile,

This is an unrealistic reaction here, as the researcher has not implied at this point that they aren't taking this seriously. In fact, the researcher has hardly said anything to characterize them at all.

The main issue with that first interview is that it's a lot of backstory dumping without ever actually giving us a chance to see either person involve as a character. I could not tell you what either character's personality is because they only said what the narrative needed them to say and nothing more.

Addendum - Incident Report 5568/IR-01

Again, this should be a video log of some kind.

The final interview and incident comes out of absolute nowhere, and the interview log doesn't actually say anything to help really explain what happened. We know that he believes the tulpa killed its host, but we never learn why he thinks that or how he thinks what he did was helpful. Right now it looks like pointless violence by a crazy person.

You've hinted at a potentially larger story, but never actually expand on that. You leave us with "oooh who should we trust" and never actually explore that hook. That actually pretty much summarizes this whole article- potentially interesting things that never get explored any further. It's just too short for whatever the story it's trying to tell is. The suicide is never actually examined in any meaningful way and exists as a footnote, and every interview is just characters saying what the narrative needs them to. This is a lot of tell with no show.

DesertMoonGW 14 Mar 2022 22:40

I greatly appreciate the critique, thank you.

+ show block

The conprocs and description are intentionally short as to not take too much time, as the SCP itself isn't intended to be the big deal of the article. The emergency update was meant to be the initial hook of getting people to think something bad happened beyond the actual anomaly and suggest that its focus is elsewhere.

For the discovery, I was actually debating a bit myself if it should be an interview log or mtf log, but settled on the interview because that's both more personal and the mtf log wouldn't reveal much, as it would just be the SCP going "Don't shoot, I surrender, take me to your leader" etc.

I'll fix the good morning line after writing this out.

I felt it was important and made sense for Weiss to tell her rank, because she's inexperienced (*Junior* Researcher) and the SCP's goal is to ensure that this information goes out.

I would have added those additional lines of <SCP sounds so and so> but that wouldn't really make sense because the only people who can see it are Weiss and the SCP itself.

I don't know why it didn't occur to me to use the suicide as a big reveal, I'll change that now.

I was worried about the block of the info dump but had trouble thinking of a better way to break down that information. I don't think the idea of the Foundation already being familiar with them is a good idea because then the twist of "who can we trust" isn't as big of a deal, because then the foundation would be ready for it.

I don't see what you mean by the sentence not meaning anything.

The missing step isn't explained because it's not important, the Tulpa isn't supposed to be the focus, the GoI is.

I included the "Please take this seriously" line because I was worried that readers wouldn't take the idea seriously.

I agree with the interview being a big story dump, I apologize for that. They don't have character because Weiss is meant to be the avenue for information from the SCP to be conveyed and nothing more.

The final incident is supposed to come out of nowhere.

We know that he believes the tulpa killed its host

This is not the case at all, if that's how it comes across then I need to change something about it. He's supposed to be angry and violent because the host did something bad for the GoI and doesn't want the tulpa talking. He's supposed to come across like a crazy violent person because that's what the GoI made him when around "degenerates" who go against them.

It's supposed to be left at "who can we trust" as a distressing cliffhanger. Guess it didn't work out as distressing.

I'm sorry you disliked it, sucks that it took actually releasing the article to get critique but hey what can ya do. Thank you for the help, maybe I can give this a full rewrite after it comes down and it'll do better next time!

DianaBerry 15 Mar 2022 00:03

You probably meant me who stated it was offensive, and what I meant by that is that Tulpmancy is often seen as a mockery of dissociative identity disorder. That doesn't mean you can't make an SCP on it but here you kinda just have it as the tulpa of a dead girl and the way you handle her death is not very careful. Like suicide should be a more sensitive subject and I feel like you just used it as a 'look how spooky it is' sorta thing..

DesertMoonGW 15 Mar 2022 03:38

I just typed up a lot and then accidentally hit the refresh key like an idiot. I also don't know how long is too long so I'm just going to put this all in a collapsible.

+ show block

Yeah, I was referring to you, I didn't want to name you because that felt rude, and like I said it was more just that I didn't understand. I don't think I treated Tulpamancy poorly, I used to be a part of that community and have immense respect for them. I felt it made sense to use for this article because it's a person that would have seen and experienced all the same things as another person, but that other person didn't survive. The suicide I understand as coming across as disrespectful, and I apologize for it.

The seed of the idea of the SCP is based on fear I've felt in the past that I don't see on the wiki very often. The fear of your friends not really being your friends, and being subservient to someone who is evil/bad/hateful/whatever, and are willing to use your friends against you if you go against them. Jess went against them, and we see the conclusion of that. She wasn't murdered, not literally, she was driven to suicide, because the group she called her friends destroyed her. If it wasn't for the anomaly of someone who witnessed every moment of this, it would have been a story untold, how they would have wanted it. The fact she killed herself is important because it shows how much she cared about them, and how little they cared about her. It's the personal fear of having a support group that only supports you as long as you are on their side and do what they want you to, and what will happen when you find that they are doing something you can't stand beside.

I hope the above paragraph makes sense. I can't promise I won't bring up the topic of suicide again in future works (if I do future works), but I do not use it lightly or for no reason, and I'm sorry if it comes across as tasteless or insensitive.

shockvaluecola 15 Mar 2022 05:50

Well, I liked it. Could it use a little polish? Sure. Have I ever heard of tulpamancy before? No, but it basically sounds like every writer who claims their characters have an independent consciousness and decision-making that the writer just reports on, which is a very common idea among writers. The main thing that really stood out was that Allemand's dialogue made me confused about his motives, and could be made a little more…straightforward, maybe? It took me a couple of re-reads to sort out that the anomaly is not actually hostile, that she's the one telling the truth and Markus is just brainwashed. But that wasn't enough to change my upvote because it's still a cool concept that I like and is reasonably well-done.